


Fear of Falling (Unconventional)

by WithExtraScribbles



Category: One Piece
Genre: Basophobia - fear of falling, Childhood Trauma, Exploring the aftermath of Kuina's death, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, I was told Kuina's death was the only backstory Zoro's got so far and needed to elaborate on that, Recovery, Supernatural Elements, Trauma
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-16
Updated: 2020-08-22
Packaged: 2021-03-06 02:14:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,654
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25925701
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WithExtraScribbles/pseuds/WithExtraScribbles
Summary: He presses his hand to the stone in front of him, feeling the cold seep into his skin. It’s weird. He never touched Kuina when she was alive. He doesn’t know why he’s bothering now.It feels wrong. He pulls his hand away, rising to his knees.“Was she your friend?”ORRoronoa Zoro has a rather unconventional relationship with death.
Relationships: Roronoa Zoro & Original Character(s), Roronoa Zoro & Original Female Character(s)
Comments: 6
Kudos: 23





	1. Part 1: 9-10

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not up to date with One Piece but was inspired to write this after my then-partner told me that there wasn't anything more added to Zoro's backstory yet after Kuina's death was featured. I sort of wanted there to be more to it - and to explore some of the consequences of it. And this was born.
> 
> It's supposed to be a oneshot but has been split into three parts.
> 
> I hope you enjoy it :)

It’s raining. Zoro knows he shouldn’t really be out here, knows that when he finds his way back someone will rat him out and he’ll receive the wrath of the adults for tracking in water and mud and whatever else attaches itself to him along the way. He shivers involuntarily as freezing water runs down the back of his neck.

If he sits here long enough, he’ll go numb, both inside and out. But for now he’s just cold and miserable and painfully over-aware of his wet clothes clinging to his body.

Still, it’s better than in there. When it rains like this, training has to move inside. And that means gathering around the edges of the room to watch the fights that Sensei and the others critique.

Ordinarily, Zoro lives for rainy days like these ones. Competition fills the air. He watches every fight with muscles coiled like a pushed down spring, just waiting for his chance to go up.

But today it was too warm in there. Too stuffy. Too many bodies. Too much noise. And even though there was no empty space because there are so many of them, there was something missing that nobody else seemed to notice.

Or rather, someone missing.

He presses his hand to the stone in front of him, feeling the cold seep into his skin. It’s weird. He never touched Kuina when she was alive. He doesn’t know why he’s bothering now.

It feels wrong. He pulls his hand away, rising to his knees.

“Was she your friend?”

And almost falls over.

“Haah?”

There is a girl sitting on top of the memorial stone next to Kuina’s, one leg dangling down, the other pulled up against her chest. Her cheek rests on it as she regards him curiously.

“She’s my friend too,” says the girl.

“You shouldn’t sit there,” says Zoro, gruffly, swiping the back of his hand against his nose – which is running because it’s cold only. And for no other reason. “It’s rude to the dead.”

The girl has the audacity to laugh. It’s a nice sound. Discordant among the grey stones, grey sky and greyer rain. “I don’t think this person minds.”

“How do _you_ know?” says Zoro, folding his arms.

“I asked.”

Zoro frowns. “You can’t ask someone anything when they’re dead.”

The girl jumps down, landing beside him. “You can,” she says brightly. “You can say whatever you want.” She turns to Kuina’s memorial and waves. “Hi Kuina, lovely weather we’re having! See?”

“That’s stupid,” says Zoro. _You’re stupid_ , he thinks.

The girl shrugs. “Maybe. Does it matter?”

He wants to say ‘yes’ because she’s annoying him. But the word sticks in his throat. Does anything matter? Kuina is dead. Everything she ever did means nothing now. She can’t keep their promise. And there’s nobody to hold him accountable for his.

He’s done with this conversation. It’s going nowhere. He turns in the other direction to the dojo deliberately, allowing his feet to take him anywhere but back.

“Where are you going?” says the girl, falling into step beside him. “You live at the dojo, right? It’s that way.” She points to the left, not directly behind them. What does she know anyway?

“It’s none of your business. Don’t follow me,” he all but growls.

She raises an eyebrow turning around and walking backwards while facing him. Zoro’s heart leaps into his mouth because there are rocks everywhere and she’s not looking. She might slip and fall and hit her head and then…

“O-oi-“ he begins. His mouth is dry.

He doesn’t even know her name.

“I’m Ruri,” she says with a wide smile. She’s still walking backwards.

He feels itchy all over. “I don’t care.”

She pouts, pivoting on one foot to walk beside him. “That’s rude.”

“You’re rude,” he says.

She looks like she wants to argue. She puffs out her cheeks. Her mouth opens then snaps shut again.

Somehow, the silence is worse.

“Zoro,” he mutters finally, scarcely audible over the driving rain.

The girl grins.

-

It’s sunny the next time he sees her. He’s just won a truly spectacular victory in training and a combination of defiance and determination brings him to Kuina’s stone. He doesn’t say anything; he still thinks that’s stupid. But he behaves appropriately and as he bows his head to ‘pay his respects’, he thinks about what Kuina might have said if she’d seen it.

She wouldn’t have been impressed; she never was. It would be a very unusual day if she ever had a kind word to say to him about his skills. But he would have been able to look her in the eye and know she understood.

He is keeping his promise. He may not be able to defeat her but he _will_ be the best.

“That’s not how you’re supposed to do it,” says a voice.

“Gah!”

He jumps backwards.

Ruri is sitting on the stone again, both legs dangling down. The sun reflects from her red hair, stark against the dark stone. She’s such an obvious figure that he wonders how he didn’t notice her climb up there.

“You can’t say anything – you’re sitting on someone’s-“

With a theatrical sigh, she jumps off. “Better?”

“No!”

She smiles anyway. “Good.”

With an irritated growl, he turns to walk away. He doesn’t have time for this; he has training to complete.

She follows. “Where are you going?”

“Training,” he says, then wonders why he bothered to answer. “Don’t – why are you following me?”

She shrugs loosely. “You’re interesting. It’s not like I have anything better to do.”

“Had enough of hanging around graveyards?” he says, in spite of himself. He should have just ignored her. Maybe if he does that, she’ll leave him alone.

“I wasn’t-” she begins. “I told you - Kuina is my friend.”

He wants to correct her. Kuina is dead. Kuina is nobody’s friend. But then, Kuina was his rival, not his friend. He’d always thought she didn’t have friends since he’d never seen her spending time with the other students, never seen her by anyone’s side unless it was Sensei’s. Maybe he’s judging her by his standards, because he doesn’t have friends either, not really. There isn’t time to play around when you’re trying to be the best. He’d always thought they were the same.

Maybe Kuina thought otherwise.

A sour taste fills his mouth. He didn’t even talk to her, did he? Their relationship was built around challenges. His challenges. They talked swordsmanship if at all. She looked down on him. He strived to prove her wrong.

He doesn’t have a right to say anything to Ruri now. She probably knew Kuina better.

“So talk to Kuina,” he bites out instead.

“Kuina isn’t going anywhere. You are, and I want to talk to you,” says Ruri.

She follows him all the way to the river, pointing out anything vaguely interesting as they walk like she's never seen sunlight on the surface of water before, like she doesn't know what a woodpecker is.

He starts out trying to ignore her but she takes every grunt he makes as confirmation that he doesn't mind her presence. Which he doesn't. Not really. Even though the world is neither quiet nor still, the normal sounds of the woodland have felt muted since Kuina died. Ruri brings them back again.

But she's still staring at everything around them with an almost frantic interest. And she's still not looking where she's going.

Zoro kicks every stone he encounters off the path. He tells himself it's because he's angry she's disrupting his training time.

A little voice in his mind supplies that it isn't.

_Just in case._

-

He doesn't visit Kuina for a while after that. Training consumes him. When training at the dojo ends, he peels away from where the other exhausted boys lay stretched out on the ground and finds his way to the river. Nobody comes with him. If anyone tries to find him, they don’t succeed.

He’s found a new place to train. It took him a while to drag the boulders he has been using along the bank without destroying the area but here he doesn’t have to balance over the roaring water and the sound of it crashing against the rocks below doesn’t set his teeth on edge and ruin his grip.

He can still hear it if he really tries but for the most part, his muscles scream and it drowns it all else, and his mind is quiet.

“You’ve moved,” says a familiar voice.

Zoro’s spine straightens too suddenly. He takes in a sharp breath, drawing frayed strings of the rope between his teeth further into his mouth. He coughs them out, the rope and the rock that weighs it down falling from his mouth and into the water below.

The resulting splash soaks his legs and the front of his shirt. It’s cold enough to make him gasp then cough again.

When he’s done, he scrambles to fish his homemade training equipment back out of the water.

“Why?” Ruri adds, waiting until he’s dragged himself back onto the bank.

He rounds on her with a glare that would make a lesser man want to run, mouth full of rude accusations that Sensei has spent a long while telling him should never be aimed towards a woman. In this moment, Ruri is not a girl but an irritation and he’s perfectly justified.

Except that when his eyes find her, she’s a little more than halfway up a very tall tree. She’s not even holding on as she sits there, legs swaying back and forth. His protests die in his mouth. His heart makes an attempt at joining it. Breakfast burns in the back of his throat.

Ruri leans towards him and for a moment, he feels the ground shift underneath him like he’s the one reliant on a flimsy piece of wood to support his weight, not her.

_She’s too high up._

She stands up, arms held either side of her like a tight-rope artist balancing on a string, and tiptoes her way towards the tree trunk.

“Hey, be – be careful!” he shouts up at her, then more quietly, less certainly, adds: “You’ll fall.”

She pauses, one leg extended towards the branch below. It’s a little out of her reach even as she stretches further, her fingertips barely maintaining contact with the tree. “Do you want me to?”

“No!” he spits. He drops the rock he’s been holding on the ground. It narrowly misses his foot but he’s already rushing forwards like he can somehow catch her, like she won’t break her neck if she does fall from there.

His chest burns. It feels like he’s drowning.

“Then I won’t,” she says as though that settles the matter, and as she does, her foot finds purchase on the branch below.

She descends with casual grace and a complete lack of concern for her own safety while Zoro waits underneath, feeling like the cold from the river has risen up and engulfed him. The closer she gets, the more he thinks to himself that if she does fall, he might be able to do something about it. Maybe he can catch her. Maybe he can break her fall. Maybe if she falls on him instead, her head won’t smash against the hard ground and her bones won’t break and he’ll be able to see her again someday and her face won’t be covered by a white cloth and _nobody_ will be crying.

She’s almost within touching distance when she stops moving. He doesn’t know how old Ruri is; he’s never asked. But she’s almost exactly the same height he is and so he assumes she’s around the same age as him. Whenever he looks at her, there’s unrestrained joy on her face that she seems to get just by existing. It makes her look young, like life is still a game to her.

But when she turns to look down at him now, she isn’t smiling. Her face is blank. Thoughtful eyes pierce him. She looks older than she is. She steps to the side, away from the tree trunk, and drops her arms to her sides.

This low in the tree, its boughs are wide and Zoro knows that there’s easily enough space to comfortably sit there. He knows, logically, that she probably doesn’t even need to try to balance there. It’s stable. It’s safe.

But it doesn’t feel that way. And when she bends her knees in obvious preparation to jump, his heart tries to launch itself out of his chest before she can.

“Don’t!” he shouts, reaching out like he can stop her.

He can’t.

Ruri jumps. He doesn’t catch her.

She lands on her feet, knees bent to absorb the impact. As she straightens with practised ease, she raises her arms like an acrobat at a show. There is a ghost of that unreadable expression on her face as she turns to face him, like she’s seeing into him.

His face has drained of its colour. He’s the ghost now.

Her frown is wiped smooth with a smile. “See? I told you I wouldn’t fall.”

“You just-“ he splutters, gesturing to the tree branch she’s just vacated.

He’s sweating and he wipes at his forehead with the back of his hand in the same movement. His heart is still beating too hard and the panic remains in his eyes. He frowns to disguise it with anger. Ah, there it is. Now it’s real.

“I jumped. There’s a difference,” she says, matter-of-factly. “I planned to jump so I also planned to land and I landed just _fine_.”

“What if you didn’t?” he half-snaps.

“But I did. I knew I could, so I did.”

“That’s-“ he throws his hands up in the air, turning away from her with a growl. “You are so _stupid_ and careless and – and _irresponsible_!”

The irony isn’t lost on him as he spits two words Sensei has used on him on numerous occasions. But it’s different when it’s not him. Nothing is going to happen to him and if it does, it doesn’t matter. He’s only irresponsible because he trains too much, but it’s also why he’s strong. He isn’t strong enough so he has to train more.

He’s weighed the risk. He’s considered it. It’s worth it.

But her? All that risk just to climb a tree? It’s not worth it. What a waste, some old lady would say at her funeral. And they’d be right.

“So are you, Mr I-Lift-Boulders-For-Fun,” says Ruri, eyes flashing dangerously as she brings her hands to her hips.

“That’s training. I have to do it to be the world’s greatest swordsman. I made a promise.” He folds his arms over his chest, staring her down furiously. His heart is still pounding, but now his blood is warmed by his rage and his face is beginning to replenish its colour.

And he can forget that ever felt fear for her. Fear is unnecessary. He won’t win by being afraid. Too much caution will only hold him back.

“So did I!” Ruri takes a step towards him, fists clenched, her long red hair whipping around her face with the sudden violent motion.

“You promised to climb trees?” he says incredulously, arms still folded. “That’s stupid.”

“That’s not it and _you’re_ stupid,” Ruri mutters, and she folds her arms and pouts.

“ _You’re_ stupid,” he replies.

“You’re _worse_ ,” she says, eyes dark as they suddenly seem to find the river much more interesting.

“Well, I’m not the one who-“

“I’m hungry,” says Ruri glumly. She turns back to him, still pouting, but without the dark look from earlier. Now she just looks mildly put out and it’s clear she no longer wants to talk about it.

Zoro hopes it’s because she knows he was right about everything.

“Did you bring lunch?” she asks, sitting down cross-legged by the water’s edge.

He’s not sure why he sits now beside her but he does. He legs his legs dangle into the water; they’re already wet and the rush of water is oddly soothing.

“No, why would I?” he says.

“Because you’re going to be here all day,” says Ruri. “Like you always are. And you don’t go home for lunch time.”

“So? I had breakfast. Two meals a day is fine,” he says, and so he doesn’t have to mention that it’s better than he used to get, adds, “And neither do you.”

“It isn’t. Lunch is important,” Ruri replies insistently. “I don’t come see you every day but you’re always here, which means you always spend lunch time here. And I’m hungry.”

He wants to tell her to go home then, if she’s so desperate for food. She doesn’t have to be here. She wears nice clothes. She’s always clean when he sees her and her eyes don’t have the hollow ring of hunger to them that he remembers seeing on the faces of other street kids, on his own gaunt face in his reflection. She doesn’t look like that so she probably has somewhere she can go to get something to eat.

Still, the memories are fresher than he wants them to be. So instead, he says grouchily, “What do want me to do about it?”

“Share your lunch with me,” she says, like it’s obvious.

“I don’t have any lunch to share.” Does she listen when he speaks?

“Next time,” Ruri clarifies. “If we’re going to be here all day then you should bring a bento. Otherwise, we won’t know if a wild animal comes to attack us because we’ll think it’s just our stomachs growling.”

“There aren’t any wild animals that would attack us here,” says Zoro, pulling his legs out of the river. It’s time to resume training.

“Really? Are you sure?” she says, with a devilish grin.

And with a sound that’s probably supposed to be a roar, she pounces. Unfortunately for her, he has incredible reflexes.


	2. Part 2: 13-14

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Part 2: 13-14
> 
> Zoro makes a friend. Onigiri are eaten. Ruri gets herself into a situation which brings up some unpleasant memories for Zoro.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaaaand Part 2 is ready to be released. Three years have passed since the last part.  
> This story is now going to be made up of 4 parts, each part being a different stage of life. I do apologise of Zoro seems a bit out of character here. I'm taking the angle that as a thirteen year old boy, he wouldn't be quite as self-assured as he is in the future. (Don't worry; it's coming though)
> 
> I had a little too much fun writing the first section of this chapter. More dojo scenes will follow in the next.
> 
> I hope you enjoy!

**Part 2: 13-14**

It takes Zoro three more years to feel comfortable taking food from breakfast to have for lunch. It isn’t that he doesn’t feel like he belongs here; he accepted his identity as a student of the dojo very quickly and his sleeping space there within a few months of being told he was not just allowed but expected to stay. He is not just a student here; he is one of the best. Even before his promise to Kuina, he owed Sensei that much from the moment he lost that fight.

Zoro works harder than anyone. He earns his place here. He earns his keep.

But there’s just something about taking food he doesn’t strictly need that feels wrong. Like it withholds something from others who might need it. Like he doesn’t have a right to it. Like he is overstepping his bounds and taking more than he is permitted.

He knows that isn’t true. Some of the other boys eat far more than they actually need. He’s seen others stuff things into their clothes for later. He’s watched the cooks throw away leftovers along with food that is no longer at its best, even though it could probably be eaten.

He tries to leave before the plates are collected so he doesn’t have to see. It makes his stomach flutter and growl, despite being neither hungry nor sick. That also means he misses his best chance to salvage any of those leftovers.

In the end, he doesn't even make the choice himself.

It is already a warm day when he drags himself to breakfast. The sun has risen already, which means he's overslept, but it is a rest day for them today and every other boy in his room is making the most of the opportunity to sleep in. He manages to sneak out without waking any of them and passes nobody on his way.

When he arrives and settles at the table, he immediately receives a bowl of rice and some cooked fish. Already, it is almost too hot for him to want to eat it. Sensei isn't there, he notes, but a few of the older students sit apart from him. They're loud enough by themselves that they barely notice his presence.

He eats quickly so he can sneak out to train by himself before anyone tries to intercept him.

"U-um, Zoro-san?"

He almost chokes on his last mouthful of rice.

The boy standing in front of him looks almost as shocked as he does. Wide brown eyes meet his then drop down immediately. In his hands is a bento box wrapped in cloth, which his fingers toy with nervously. Zoro knows him, remembers his face but not his name.

This is the new boy, about his age, who was given kitchen duty a week or so ago after making a mess of the storeroom.

Zoro hasn't paid him any mind. He isn't here to make friends; he’s here to become the world’s greatest swordsman. This boy doesn't seem to even want to be a good swordsman. Whatever it is Sensei has them do, he is always one of the first to leave.

But he is new and Zoro’s not enough of an asshole to make the boy unwelcome if he has a question he needs to ask. He looks at the new boy and nods to show he's listening. "Yeah?"

"You - I've noticed - you don't come in for lunch. Hotaru-san told me you uh - you're training all day? So..." He wrings his hands.

Zoro raises an eyebrow. "Yeah, I am. It's not worth the time to walk back."

He doesn't know why he feels the need to justify it but the boy's hand is shaking and there's a bead of sweat dripping down his forehead. Zoro is aware that the others frequently call him a monster - he assumes it's mostly due to his combat abilities and not out of fear of him - but it seems this boy has got the wrong idea.

"That's - that's not good. Lunch is important."

The boy's face reddens. He thrusts the bento out towards Zoro, once again meeting his gaze then looking immediately away. He's still shaking like Zoro might summon a sword from the air and cut him down where he stands.

"So I'm told," mutters Zoro, with the air of a long suffering soul. Which he is. Because Ruri is relentless. And he already wants to take a nap just thinking about whether they're going to have this conversation again today.

"Aren't you going to take it?" says the boy. "It's - I promise it's good."

There is the vaguest hint of a nervous smile on the boy's face, though his hands are still shaking.

Zoro stares down at the offered bento like it is a picture in a book. It looks just like it belongs in one. "I'm supposed to take it?"

The boy nods decisively. "It's your lunch," he says simply, then wavers. "It's – you really should take it – I – I mean… if you don't want it…”

Zoro takes it before the boy can keep babbling. "I didn't say I didn't want it."

The boy stops mid word, his mouth hanging upon for a forgotten vowel before widening into a grin. For the first moment since the conversation began, there is no tension in his shoulders and he seems at ease.

Slowly the nerves creep back in. "O-oh, okay. Well, I - I hope you enjoy it. Let me know if there's anything you want done differently."

Let him know? Zoro frowns. Why would he need to do that?

"Wendel!" shouts a sharp female voice.

The loud boasting and backslapping from the other side of the room ceases abruptly. A collective shudder passes through all inhabitants of the dojo. The new boy – Wendel, his name is Wendel – straightens like a rod struck by lightning.

Despite knowing that there's no way that the new boy could have scraped together a bento without the head cook knowing, Zoro sets it on his lap, hiding it under the table.

"Ah - c-coming, Sato-san!"

As all eyes converge on the boy hurrying back towards the kitchen, Zoro tucks the bento into his shirt and slips out of the door unnoticed.

-

It takes Zoro longer to arrive at his favourite training spot than he would like. It's already too warm, even though it's overcast. He's probably eaten too much for breakfast because he can still feel the warm weight of rice in his belly. It's not unwelcome but it slows him. And the paths keep moving so it's nearly midday by the time he finally reaches his destination.

He doesn't see Ruri as he sets the bento under the shade of a nearby tree - one that Ruri likes to sit in to torment him because she knows he isn't going to climb up after her. He wonders briefly if summer has started now. She doesn’t visit him in the summer, says it’s too hot and she burns easily under the sun. She blames her red hair but Zoro knows that really, it’s her pale skin.

Selfishly, he hopes she does come today, so he can rub his lunch in her face. Literally perhaps because she _is_ always complaining that she’s hungry. As though it’s his responsibility to care for her. As though he invites her to join him.

But for now, he's wasted enough training time. He splashes his face with cold water from the river, picks up the nearest boulder and begins his usual routine with more than his usual enthusiasm.

Two hours later, he throws his boulder aside and himself in the river to cool down. The water is still cold and the current provides extra challenge to what would otherwise be a gentle and leisurely swim.

When he pulls himself out, he almost falls back in. Ruri is sitting in a tree opposite him, the lowest branch this time, legs crossed primly as she observes him. Her lips twitch with amusement.

"Ruri!" he shouts furiously. She’s been sitting there silently specifically to surprise him.

"What?" she says. "I did call you but you were too busy doing your best shark impression."

“I was swimming,” he says trying to look unbothered even though he knows what’s coming next.

“Did the mighty predator catch any fish?” she says, making a snapping jaw motion with her hands.

You try to catch a fish for lunch _one time._

“I was swimming,” he replies, blatantly ignoring the way his cheeks start to heat up. “And I would have caught something too if you hadn’t been scaring all the fish.”

She throws back her head and laughs, swinging her legs back and forth. Her body rocks. Her hands are folded in her lap, unbothered about stability.

Zoro looks away, fighting down the uncomfortable roll of his stomach. He's just hungry. That's all it is. Ruri is fine up there. Even though she's thirteen or fourteen now (he still hasn't asked) and not nine, so she weighs considerably more than she used to. She's up there all the time and she's never fallen. Not once.

He can trust her. If he doesn't look, he can pretend she's safely on the ground.

He hears, rather than sees her jumping down. Even though he can’t control the way he immediately turns to look, to check she’s alright, she is already straightening up by the time his eyes find her.

“How could I possibly scare the fish from dry land?” she says and leans back against the tree where the breeze doesn’t touch her.

“They heard your stomach growling and thought some hungry beast was coming to eat them,” he says, wringing the water out of his shirt.

“You _were_ coming to eat them,” Ruri remarks.

“I wasn’t the one complaining about being hungry,” Zoro retorts.

His stomach gurgles before she can reply. She raises an eyebrow, the corners of her lips twitching. He folds his arms over his chest and glares.

“I’m not –“ he starts to deny.

She splutters out a laugh, doubling over, arms gripping at her sides. “I don’t need lunch!” she says between giggles, putting on a different voice. “Two meals a day is fine! I had a big big breakfast! I never complain about being hungry!”

“I _don’t_!” he hisses. “And I don’t sound like that.”

“No, your stomach provides you with backing vocals.” Ruri sags against the tree, theatrically wiping her eyes. She slips down the trunk and ends up sinking to her butt at the base. “Oh, that was too good. Hey, maybe you could try catching the fish with your mouth and save on time preparing and cooking them?”

He stomps over to his bento, still tucked away at the base of a different tree, grabs it by the knot in the fabric and then returns to her, waving it in front of her face.

Ruri scrambles to the side before he can drop it on her, laughter turning to alarm. He freezes; had she thought he was going to hit her?

Only once she’s out of bento range do her eyes focus on what was about to fall into her lap. She speaks as though her overreaction never happened but her legs are only half folded and she has one foot underneath her, ready to jump up if she has to.

“Is that a bento? _You_ made _lunch_?”

The dumbfounded expression on Ruri’s face makes Zoro want so desperately to take credit for this just to see how she reacts. But honesty is important. This is not his work. And he just wants her to sit down properly and relax.

“I brought it with me,” he answers. “One of the other students made it.”

“For you specifically?” says Ruri.

He settles carefully into a sit and begins unwrapping the bento box with a reverence that ordinary items do not usually receive from him.

“Yeah,” he says.

And with that, the remaining tension drains from Ruri’s body. She pitches to the side, tucking her legs in and leaning one hand on the ground to support herself as she peers into his bento while maintaining a respectable distance from him.

“Aaaww,” she says. “You made a friend.”

He gives her a pointed look. “I did not.”

“Making someone lunch is a pretty friendly thing to do,” says Ruri.

“He was on kitchen duty,” says Zoro, like that explains everything. To him, it does.

“Someone cooks every day but you’ve never brought a bento before. Look how nicely it’s tied.”

It had been tied pretty nicely. Now it’s been undone and Zoro is lifting off the lid. It is oddly exciting. Zoro has long since passed the point at which food is exciting for him; it’s just a necessity now. But Ruri is more accurate than she knows. He has never had a bento before. It probably just contains leftovers from the night before or extras from breakfast.

Ruri watches curiously as four nori-wrapped onigiri are revealed. Not last night’s leftover curry. Not this morning’s fried fish and rice. Actual onigiri that someone has made.

Maybe this is what the others would be having for lunch.

“You can have half,” he says to Ruri, prying apart two of the onigiri and offering one to her.

The other he pops into his mouth, tearing off a third of it immediately. It’s good. It’s so good. It must show on his face because he closes his eyes for the briefest of moments – a blink really – and when they open again, Ruri is smirking and waving his hand away.

“No need,” she says. “That’s all yours. I brought lunch too.”

And she reaches into her obi and produces an onigiri of her own.

His onigiri falls out of his mouth.

“Ruri!” he hisses as he scoops it up and stuffs it back in.

“Gross, Zoro,” says Ruri, radiating disapproval.

“What do you expect me to do - waste it?” he says before he’s even swallowed.

“Keep your mouth closed when you eat. I’ve already seen what that looks like all chewed up once – and now it’s got grass in it.” She wrinkles her nose, taking a dainty bite out of her own onigiri. “If it’s been on the ground, it’s not good food anymore.”

“It does not have grass in it,” Zoro grumbles before he takes another bite. Even though it probably did. “The green was the nori.”

“Gross,” Ruri replies.

“And it was still good. Really good. If someone’s made it, you should eat it.”

And he won’t hear anything else on it.

-

He doesn’t hear her.

It’s late autumn. The water is cold. He can hear the steady pump of his heart through his ears as he swims along the riverbed. He’s swimming underneath the water today because holding his breath and battling his buoyancy is part of the challenge. And also, perhaps mostly, because Ruri doesn’t like that he’s in here so he’s motivated by spite.

It’s a slippery slope. He should know this. Ruri gives as good as she gets. But she also doesn’t know better than he does. Not in this case. She knows more than him – he’s not so stupid that he doesn’t notice the fancy kimonos she always wears. She definitely comes from a family with money. Money buys education. He has one too, courtesy of Sensei. But his focus is his swordsmanship. She wants to know everything about everything.

She doesn’t like that he swims when it gets cold. She thinks it will make him sick, starts out saying things like ‘hypothermia’ like he isn’t used to being cold. Zoro is never sick. Sickness is for people who have time for it and Zoro has never had time for that.

So he’s under the water because it’s even colder here so he can prove her even more wrong. And if his eyes are battling the biting cold and sediment from the river bed, they can’t see Ruri’s retaliation up in the nearest tree.

The last time he looked, she was hanging upside down with her knees hooked around a branch. She’ll hop from branch to branch. She’ll go higher than she normally would. And she’ll taunt him the whole time.

Why doesn’t he come up here? It’s warmer. It’s closer to the sun.

That isn’t the point and she knows it. So he embraces the cold grasp of ( _not fear, not panic_ ) concern for her safety, and he lets the cold soak into his body from the outside too.

When he comes up for breath, his head hurts and his ears ring. It’s colder than usual. He’s underestimated it. He casts a cursory glance over towards Ruri to see if she’s noticed that he might be struggling a little more than usual.

And he realises it’s not his ears that are ringing.

Ruri is still upside down. One of her arms is bent back too far, her hand clinging to a branch – a newer one, which is too thin to hold her properly and bends as her body shifts. Her other hand is reaching out, trying to grasp at another nearby bough but it’s too far and she can’t stretch any further. Because her ankle is caught, twisted unnaturally above her. And her other leg dangles down uselessly with nothing to help support her weight.

As she shifts, a branch cracks and she screams.

He slips in his scramble out of the river.

“Ruri!”

“I’m stuck,” she says, her voice high and shaky. “I can’t – I can’t get down.”

The world tilts as he stands breathlessly underneath her. She’s too high up. She’s always too high up. He could have stopped her. He should have stopped her. He can’t reach. If her foot comes free, she’s going to fall.

He sees her then, her red hair pooled around her, blood darkened. Her arms and legs splayed unnaturally. Her head tilted too far, neck broken because she fell. She fell. And he couldn’t catch her.

“I’ll catch you,” he says, even though he knows it won’t be enough.

_Kuina fell down the stairs, they said. Her head collided with the stone floor. It took weeks before the blood stains were removed from the cracks between the stones. Twelve steps. They never knew which one she fell from. Twelve steps. One misstep._

_Kuina fell._

_Kuina died._

There is at least thirty-five feet between Ruri and the ground.

“I’m _stuck_ ,” Ruri repeats, her dark eyes wild and wide in her pale face. “My foot’s stuck – I can’t get down – I… I need you to help me…”

The last two words are filled with quiet desperation. Her eyes are squeezed shut. She takes in a shaky breath which he notices because he can’t move, can’t breathe, can’t look away. Every time she tries to move the branches shift.

“How?” the breath leaves him.

Help. He’ll go for help. Sensei will come. They’ll get a ladder. They can free her and carry her down. But it’s a long walk. Ruri’s body is quivering with the effort of holding herself up. She can’t hold on for that long. If he so much as looks away, she will fall.

_There was nothing anybody could have done, they said. Nobody was there to catch her. She hit her head. They couldn’t save her._

Ruri lifts her head. Her hair comes free of her hair pins, falls over her face and parts like a curtain of red.

_Red pours from the corners of her mouth, her nose, her ears as she lies pale and still on the ground._

There is sadness in her eyes as she looks down at him.

“Please…”

He can’t leave her. He can’t catch her. He can’t let her fall. He’ll have to go up and get her.

He hasn’t climbed anything since he was nine years old. He remembers swinging from branch to branch with ease. He remembers shimmying up guttering and dangling from washing lines without difficulty, without thought. He’s stronger now.

He can do this.

“Fucking hell,” he spits as he grabs the nearest handhold and hauls himself up.

His fingertips are frozen and slick from the river. His arms shake and his muscles burn with a fatigue he didn’t feel until now. _He isn’t going to make it in time. He’s going to fall._

“Left,” says Ruri. “Reach to your left. No, that’s right.”

Her voice sounds far away and quiet but urgent. He can’t see her because he’s busy looking to his left for – he grabs it. His hand slips. Then his foot finds purchase on a knot below and he recovers his grip. A gust of wind bites into his back. There’s a crack from above him.

“Shit!” he spits.

“It’s okay,” says Ruri like that crack does not foreshadow her doom. Her voice is low and comforting. “It’s fine. We’re fine.”

 _He doesn’t believe her._ He believes her. She has to be fine; he’s nearly there.

He looks down and regrets it. The boulders he trains with look small. His vision swims. _If he fails, Ruri is going to fall down onto those rocks below._ His stomach lurches.

“Ah!” Ruri gasps above him.

He needs to be faster. He has to save her.

Pushing everything else aside, he seizes the thick bough above him and puts all his upper body strength into pulling himself up onto it. Momentum carries him further so he rolls with it, like sparring, uses it jump forwards onto the next branch.

_Reckless._

Doesn’t matter. Speed matters.

He hears a loud crack above him. Something falls, clattering against the tree trunk above his head then falling _down, down, down_ until it shatters into pieces on impact with the ground. His heart leaps into his mouth as he clings to the trunk for stability.

“Ruri!”

A bigger crack follows. He looks up. She’s only a few feet away from him. The branch trapping her ankle has broken. Her foot is free and begins to fall. Her fingers scrabble for purchase on the branch below. They slip away.

_She falls._

Zoro abandons the tree trunk, abandons all thoughts of safety and lunges for her. Her kimono sleeve slips like air through his unfeeling fingers.

Inside him, something plummets like she does as he screams her name.

She lands two feet below him, awkwardly straddling the branch below. She hugs it tightly, pressing her face against the wood. Then she starts to laugh.

Zoro falls back against the tree trunk, legs shaking. Everything is shaking as the adrenaline begins to fade.

“I-“ he begins. _I’m sorry. I failed. I couldn’t catch you._

“You did it,” says Ruri, looking up now. There are tears beading in the corners of her eyes. “Look how high up we are!”

“What?” he says. _What the hell?_

He looks even though he doesn’t want to. The river stretches out ahead of them, sparkling slightly under a sudden burst of winter sun. Ruri rearranges herself to sit staring out over it all, a small, satisfied smile on her face.

“I knew you could do it!” she grins.

“What?” he repeats.

It is over. It’s alright. _It isn’t._ Ruri is safe. _She isn’t._ He can almost reach out and touch her. _He can’t._ His heart, hammering between his ears, still thinks he has something to fight.

“You nearly died!” he says finally, one hand clutching at his chest, which heaves under his fist. His other hand grips the branch below tightly. His knuckles are white. So is his face. “You were falling – I told you you were going to fall but you didn’t listen.”

Ruri regards him curiously. Her legs sway underneath her and he sees her dangling there again, unable to catch herself. He feels sick. She leans back to get a better look at him and his heart jumps in his chest. She is unconcerned.

“I didn’t fall,” she says simply.

She has that weird blank expression on her face again, like she’s watching how he’ll react before she decides how she feels.

“That looked a lot like falling from where I was standing,” he snaps.

She shrugs. “But it wasn’t the problem. I didn’t say I was going to fall - I said I was stuck. I came unstuck. And now you’re here too. Isn’t the view nice?”

“No,” says Zoro, fuming. His hands are still shaking. He isn’t afraid _but she’s thirty feet off the ground and if she falls he can’t reach her and why is she leaning back like that? She’s going to fall._ He isn’t afraid. He is furious.

She shrugs again. “I think it is. Warmer too. You can feel the sun on you when you’re closer to the top.”

“It isn’t,” Zoro spits. “It’s freezing.”

He starts to look for the best way down without sharing a branch with her. The ground is taunting him. The river is taunting him. He can hear the water rushing from below with every heartbeat in his ears. His cold clothes echo the icy shock he felt moments earlier.

He’ll go down first. _Just in case._

Ruri intercepts him with a sharp look. “What is your problem?”

“You!” he hisses. He has the sudden, violent urge to shove her and it horrifies him. He practically shouts over it. “You nearly died. You don’t even care about it! You’re the one with the problem!”

Her eyebrows raise. She regards him for a long moment. “I was never in any real danger.”

“What the fuck?” he hisses, eyes narrowed. “Does that look like no danger to you?”

He gestures angrily at the ground waiting for them below.

_Kuina died. She fell down a staircase of twelve steps and she died._

“That isn’t-“ she sighs a heavy sigh. She seems suddenly older than she is. “I didn’t mean it like that. I knew I wasn’t going to fall far enough to hurt. I trust myself. I trust my skills. And you were there. I knew you would come to help me.”

_There was nothing anybody could have done; nobody was there to help her._

“Yeah, well…” He wants to be angry. He really does. But all the fight leaves him with that last sentence and he’s suddenly exhausted. Rage turns to loathing and unease. “I wasn’t fast enough to be any help.”

“Nah,” says Ruri. She’s smiling again. “I just didn’t need your help this time. But if it bothers you that much, practise makes you faster. Oh, it looks like it’s lunch time.”

Food is the last thing on his mind, but relief floods him as she adds, “Let’s go down.”

“Are you…” he says, gesturing to her foot, the one that had been trapped. “Are you alright?”

“Yep!” she says with entirely too much cheer, popping the ‘p’ with exaggerated enthusiasm.

Zoro climbs down ahead of her, testing each branch as he goes. If he’s too slow, she doesn’t complain or try to hurry him. She descends carefully, the branches remaining still as she spreads her weight between them.

When he jumps down from the lowest branch, feeling the shock reverberate through frozen knees, he turns to watch, to make sure she lands safely. She hops down gracefully, giving no indication that she’s been hurt.

Her hair is loose now but there is not a scratch on her. He spends twenty minutes searching for her lost hair pins before they can sit down to eat. She finds them an hour later, tucked down the back of her kimono.

“No harm done,” she says, tucking into an onigiri, which somehow survived the whole event in her obi. “But you look like you could really do with some warm clothes.”

No harm done.

He struggles through two hundred sub-standard reps before it begins to hail and he admits defeat. Ruri huddles under a tree, legs hugged miserably against her chest until the hail abates and turns to drizzle.

She doesn’t let him walk her home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading!
> 
> As always, comments bring me a great amount of joy and inspire me to keep writing. All comments are welcome, including constructive criticism.
> 
> I am still new to this fandom (and not up to date), so I'm getting to know the characters.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!
> 
> Comments bring me joy and fuel me to continue writing. Any thoughts are appreciated :)


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